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French Freedom of Speech

The mayor of Calais is suing Marine Le Pen of the Front National for saying "repeatedly" that citizens in Calais need a pass issued by the mayor to get to their own homes (because of the number of migrants in the town). In fact, the passes are issued by the police prefecture.

Who's en colère today?

The SNCF (toujours eux), regional train employees in the Lyons area guaranteeing unpleasant travel from the 17th-21st December
Also yet another strike by Sud-Rail, a particularly truculent SNCF union in the south of France, this time five days in January: 6,7, 21, 22 and 23. "We have no choice." Right.

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"There is a traitor among us": the French at World Cup soccer

In 1998, my family and friends gathered around the television at home in Paris to cheer for the French team, playing in the new Stade de France in the final of the World Cup, against the heavily favored Brazilians. We were prepared with big French flags and the children had painted bleu-blanc-rouge war stripes on their faces. It was an exhilarating time and one member of the family actually turned down a chance to be at the Stade itself to be with the rest of us. When the French won, you didn't have to be watching television to know. The whole city started yelling, singing, honking, blowing horns out of windows, and making for the Champs-Élysées, where a light-show against the Arc de Triomphe flickered over a happy, celebrating crowd, with occasional Brazilians draped in their national flag walking around looking shell-shocked. There was an atmosphere that the French call de bon enfant, and lots of children and women among the throng.

The French team's role in this World Cup has been less glorious and is quickly making the French the team to watch, but for all the wrong reasons. A referee cheated the Irish out of a World Cup place when Thierry Henry blatantly used his hand twice to hit the ball. The French team's first match in South Africa was a scoreless draw against Uruguay. Then on Thursday the Bleus did even worse against Mexico. Not only was the score 2-0 against them, but they did not even seem to be trying to play hard. "I saw a player walking in the World Cup!" fumed 1998 player Bixente Lizarazu about striker Nicolas Anelka.

During half time, in the privacy of the locker room, as trainer Raymond Domenech talked to the team, Anelka muttered words to his teammates that Domenech clearly overheard. Anelka says that what has been reported in the press is "not exactly" what he said, but the consensus turns around something like "Va te faire enculer, fils de pute!" Domenech told him he was excluded from the second half of the game. But worse was to follow. After the insults came to light in the press, the president of the French Football Federation asked Anelka to apologize and he refused. So Anelka was kicked off the French team and got on a plane to leave South Africa.

Both Patrice Evra, the captain of the team, and Domenech have said that Anelka's behavior, while "inadmissible," was not unprecedented for a team under pressure. But once the report was in the media, the FFF had no choice but to exclude Anelka.

In his press conference yesterday next to the FFF president, Evra said that the problem was not Anelka. "The problem is the traitor who is among us. There is a traitor in this group. We must eliminate him."

"I feel bad for all the children for whom the team of France represents something," said Domenech.

Franck Ribéry, a member of the victorious 1998 team, said, "I ask for forgiveness from all the French that they have not had the World Cup they wanted. We weren't good, we didn't sweat the way we should have." Asked about the team's internal problems, Ribéry replied that the team had "burst apart" (explosé). "It's France which is hurting, our country. I say honestly that I am hurting."

Elaine Sciolino in ParisOf the N.Y. Times (or as it prefers to be known, The N.Y. Times) and writer of La Seduction: How the French Play the Game of Life

Le Franco PhoneyA long-term Australian expat in a French ski resort. I can't believe it took me so long to discover this one.

The Compleat AngloI have to like a blog that is named The Compleat Anglo. An Englishman married to his Madame, in the Basque country

Flipflop France23-year-old Sasha, an Oregonian from Forks (town made famous by the Twilight vampire saga), has settled down in France's second city, Lyons. [No that isn't a mistake. I spell it the old-fashioned English way.]